Jakarta: The Directorate General of Immigration (DGI) signed an immigration cooperation agreement with the Australian Department of Home Affairs (DHA) on Monday (23/03/2023) in Jakarta. This partnership aims to design innovations on digitalization in the service system and immigration law enforcement.

"Today, I signed an agreement with the Australian Department of Home Affairs, represented by the Associate Secretary for Immigration, Ms. Stephanie Foster, and staff. We are following up on several things, such as forming a technical working group on information technology development to facilitate the exchange of information regarding the system architecture and immigration innovations of the two countries," said Silmy after a meeting with the Australian Immigration delegation in the DGI headquarters, Kuningan, South Jakarta.

On the other hand, the Australian Department of Home Affairs views it as crucial for further cooperation to strengthen border security between the two countries. Several other points of the agreement in the cooperation arrangement are Smart Gates access for Indonesian E-Passport holders, immigration document forensics to identify forgery on passports, border operations center, Airlines Liaison Officer Program, management of illegal migration, prevention of transnational crimes and working and holiday visas.

Silmy also revealed that Immigration is implementing system improvements to support accelerating innovation, making it easier for the people. Regulations and system infrastructure for the implementation of several new types of visas are also being finalized. The new types of visas include golden visas, sports visas, diaspora visas, and other visas.

"Many of the lessons we learned after our visit to Australia last month included databases of foreigners, alert list data or exit/entry prevention lists, and other best practices. The DGI has stopped granting visa exemption facilities to 168 countries and imposing Visa On Arrival. It is a lesson from the Australian Immigration who impose visas on anyone who wants to enter Australian Territory so that the system can minimize immigration problems caused by foreigners," he explained.

On this occasion, the Associate Secretary of the Department of Home Affairs Australia, Stephanie Foster, advised on Indonesia's border security. Australian Immigration points out that Indonesian Immigration can check as early as possible on foreigners who will enter Indonesian Territory long before the person concerned reaches Indonesian Territory.

"We have responded well to the proposal from Australia as a measure to contain foreigners who are not beneficial to Indonesia as a form of pushing the border forward to guard the borders of the two countries so that cases of illegal migrants can be minimized," said Silmy.